Will Arnett's Batman steals the show

Comic actor Will Arnett found his voice in animated films. In "The Lego Movie," opening Friday, Arnett regularly steals the show with his hip, edgy, and downright hilarious performance as Batman.

Ed SymkusFor The Patriot Ledger

Comic actor Will Arnett broke into the business in the mid-1990s by landing small parts in little-seen films ("Ed's Next Move," "Southie"), moved over to guest roles in all sorts of TV shows ("Sex and the City," "Boston Public"), found his voice in animated films ("Ratatouille," "Monsters vs Aliens,") and gained his biggest recognition as Gob Bluth in "Arrested Development."

In "The Lego Movie," opening Friday, though most of the dialogue and action goes to the voices of Chris Pratt as Emmett and Elizabeth Banks as Wildstyle," Arnett regularly steals the show with his hip, edgy, and downright hilarious performance as Batman, who comes across much more as an anti-hero than a hero. Arnett, 43, whose natural speaking voice really is as deep and gravelly as the ones his characters usually have, talked about the film, his career, and his kids last week in Los Angeles.

Q: You're doing a large amount of both live-action work and vocal work these days. Has that been your plan all along?

A: I had to spend many years paying my rent in New York as a voiceover guy. Then once I started working much more as an actor, I guess it sort of logically made sense that I would start doing more animated fare. But like everything in my life I had zero plan, and stuff just happened, and then I'd go, "Oh, yeah, I meant to do that." It was just very fortuitous. I consider myself very lucky to have been able to do it.

Q: What was your inspiration for finding the voice of Batman?

A: I read the Old Testament repeatedly. No, [directors] Phil Lord and Chris Miller and I talked early on about the idea of looking at all the Batmen that had come before, and trying to see what would make us laugh at what we liked about all of those Batmen. So, at the first couple of sessions, we spent a lot of time with that voice, finding what was working and what wasn't. We kept hitting on the idea that the more serious Batman took himself, the funnier he was. That's where we ended up.

Q: Did you have a back story for him to help you do the part?

A: I had the easiest job in the sense that everybody knows who Batman is. But what was fun was taking that kind of iconic character, who's such a part of the fabric of popular culture, and kind of changing the rules to him a little bit. That was fun, and funny to me, because he's not necessarily the Batman that we've all become accustomed to. He has a pretty bad-ass fight with Bad Cop/Good Cop (voice of Liam Neeson), but I think that in the end he ends up redeeming himself.

Q: There's a point in the film where you get to sing a kind of nasty but funny song about what Batman does. What's the story behind that?

A: That was Phil and Chris. They decided that Batman has this crazy dark side where he has all this other stuff going on that you don't really know about. It was a real treat to do that, and it turns out it was perfect because I have a terrible what you would refer to as a singing voice. It was actually sing-screaming.

Q: What kind of response have you gotten from your kids?

A: I have a 3-year-old and a 5-year-old, and they haven't seen it yet, but they're both extremely excited. I love that my youngest keeps referring to it as "The Lego Batman Movie."